


dew of dying stars

by brownsugarboba



Category: League of Legends
Genre: Dark Cosmic Jhin - Freeform, Galaxy Slayer Zed, M/M, odyssey/cosmic au??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-18 00:47:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28609278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brownsugarboba/pseuds/brownsugarboba
Summary: jhin finds something of note
Relationships: Khada Jhin/Zed
Kudos: 27





	dew of dying stars

**Author's Note:**

> if you see me posting this instead of updating other projects i said i was working on, no you don't ❤️
> 
> idk what this is!! ya boy finally got jhin's dark cosmic skin and has been thinking about it ever since so here we are! 
> 
> if the lore's all jank, whatever man. it's a weird space assassin dude and a cosmic being holding hands over spacewide murder. gotta have fun with it!!
> 
> title is taken from stardew by purity ring. it has nothing to do with it/them, i just liked the lyric lol ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

Another star whimpers as it dies, and Jhin frowns. Another wrong note means he’ll have to begin anew.

It’s taxing to dance throughout creation, to inhale the court’s (uninspired, insipid, utterly _meaningless_ ) works and to exhale his art (a yawning void, ceaseless and unending; staggering in its infinity). Life resists beauty, resists _him_ , but he is a patient god, and he isn't swayed when things that are ultimately nothing cry out in a bid to avoid being unmade unto their truest selves.

A star plucked from its hideous galaxy here, a nebula delicately adjusted to glitter _just so_ there, each placed according to his keen, ever discerning eye and the canvas is ready.

He fires once (energy cascades from a burst star in a shimmering dance of twirling hues), twice (planets crack and split, their chaotic forms dispersing and adding much needed texture to the composition), a third time (the nebula bursts in ragged petals that unfurl only in unmaking), and in a moment that is both instant and prolonged, comes the fourth shot and it's all gone.

There's nothing now in the newly created endless dark—such is the way of annihilation—and Jhin's mind sings, attempts to make form where he'd lovingly brushed a broad stroke of nothingness. It's wondrous, and it's terrible. The death rattle of this galaxy and the echoing call for his attention from distant others harmonize and are a choir unlike any other. They sing for him, eager to hear the clarion call to embrace the end as orchestrated by his hands, and how can he resist?

These lesser beings, they don't know that they call out like this in hollow whispers across the universe, but everything about them is conducive to entropy and demands it. They can't fully appreciate his work when in his endless mercy he makes the inevitable a stunning event, but an ignorant audience is no reason not to create. Besides, there is one who may have an inkling of understanding: the one who calls himself the Galaxy Slayer.

He's derivative, trite, and pathetically small-scale in comparison, but Jhin can muster an iota, the merest speck of infinitesimally small stardust that makes up his care for the pale slayer inhabiting the site of where he'll make his latest work and making the song here play at a different pitch.

"Galaxies?" he lilts, a spectral hand reaching out from under his cloak to trace the slayer's gilded jaw softly. "You must think bigger. You've the capacity for understanding the true beauty in annihilation, yes, but your stage, the scope of your ambition…"

Jhin tuts and he glides to stand in front of the other who merely watches.

"Such a shame. Golden and yet so very, very reserved in your execution," Jhin says quietly and runs a pointed fingertip down a glimmering blade. It tingles, the very essence of life for these beings if he’s come to understand correctly. He swears it wavers at his touch; knows who he is and instinctively wants to cower in the presence of divinity.

"We are to be the end of all, the bladed hand of order that silences the chaos of being. There is no ambition, only our will," the slayer says and Jhin laughs, raising a hand to cover his masked mouth in a mockery of being demure.

"And such delusions! Tell me, to whom does "we" refer to, exactly?" he asks, and the burning bright spot of his eye focuses on the other a little more.

There's disharmony in the other, a fundamental opposition of self and whatever else he's composed of, and yet it doesn't ring terribly to Jhin's mind.

The slayer tenses but answers, "We are Zed."

He isn't pure, he isn't chosen by the Dark Star like he or his lesser cohorts, but there's a certain novelty in the walking microcosm of life seeking to extinguish all other forms of it. Jhin doesn't mind too much that he has to shrink down to a size that's terribly small to converse with him; the amusement in speaking with a pale imitation of himself offered a hint of flattery which in the grand scheme of things isn't entirely insignificant. Until now, it's just been the insufferable presence of the Court and then the nonsense of the others the Dark Star erroneously chose.

"Zed, then. Tell me, does this galaxy whisper to you?" Jhin asks, tilting his head. "Do you hear it sing and scream? A cacophony that expects, no, demands annihilation?"

Zed stands still, considering, and while Jhin doesn't breathe, he's sure moments like these are where breathlessness is born.

There's a palpable anticipation, a terrible tension as Jhin waits to see if there's someone whose muse is even remotely similar to the Dark Star.

"Yes," Zed says simply, and Jhin knows it isn't seen but is sure Zed knows he's smiling.

They don't collaborate from there, Jhin is never one to share the artistic process, but _something_ is born from the meeting.

He arranges the stars before he leaves; adjusts the dark to best suit the arrangement of Zed's slow, meticulous work so that each death he brings has an appropriate backdrop. He bids these beings a beautiful end with his work, and he bids Zed a stage far greater than what he can hope to grasp.

Zed doesn't quite appreciate it when he returns, sees no need for the artistry Jhin added, and for a moment, Jhin fumes. He wants to tear the pale man apart, to rip the rippling gold from him and elevate it to something else. He wants to devour him and show him firsthand just what he delivers—but he doesn't.

The night shrouds them on the planet Jhin will let Zed clean up before he destroys it. He touches and explores the contradiction of Zed's self with light glides of slight hands over cold skin.

He wants to devour Zed again, but there's no heat of anger this time. It's a more primal feeling, perhaps what he thinks the Dark Star strives for though him and the others. He wants to devour and become one with this amalgamation of selves that are single-minded in their goals.

He doesn't, not yet, but he does make his starlight tinged flesh pressed against Zed's feel something of a sacrament. A show of favour and damnation all at once as he allows Zed to remove his mantle, but never his mask because he wants to savour when he finally makes something timeless and beautiful of him.

Zed is small, he's no eye for art, and he kills with precision and efficiency over artistic merit, and yet he's above Jhin now, curled and holding him close as he gratefully takes his taste of the night.

Zed clings to him when it's over and shudders in the chill, asks "When?" and Jhin hushes him.

"Soon," he promises him, a life sentence and gift all at once. "Your time will come, and when it does, you will be perfect."

Jhin departs and leaves nothing but an arrangement in the dark that he knows Zed can piece his image from as these beings are wont to do.

One by one, they'll wink out as he tears down his false self to herald his arrival and then, finally, he'll take Zed into his work, and in turn, him.

**Author's Note:**

> ty for reading
> 
> come say hi!! starguardiansett @ tumblr


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